New research highlights new, troubling ethics violations

The jury’s still out, but not for much longer. In 2025, numerous studies examined the role of artificial intelligence, particularly Large Language Models (LLMs), as possibly aiding many  mental health services, as well as its prospective hazards. 

Based on their findings, authors of a new study from Brown University recently argued: 

…mental health support, especially psychotherapy, cannot be approached as a formulaic computational task, as it demands strict adherence to ethical standards and professional codes of conduct, something LLMs are prone to violating in real-world practice. Without clear legal guidelines and regulatory frameworks, LLM counselors risk exposing vulnerable users to unmitigated harm.

Their research consisted of “an 18-month ethnographic collaboration with mental health practitioners” to create and evaluate “evidence-based system prompts” which were then used in 27 simulated sessions to “map LLM counselors’ behavior…to professional codes of conduct.” They discovered “15 risks that persist” in several different AI models, even with improved prompt strategies.

Researchers worked with three versions of GPT, two of Llama, and two of Claude. The simulated sessions used “publicly available sessions with an LLM counselor using publicly available transcripts”—in other words, the material was ethically sourced.

Professional codes of conduct

In addition to acquiring years of education, and putting in many, many hours of supervised training before gaining certification and/or licensure, mental health professionals also rely on ethical and practice guidelines. These are designed to keep practitioners from making mistakes that might harm their clients.

The Brown researchers referenced codes published by the American Psychological Association (APA). the National Association of Social Workers (NASW), the American Counseling Association (ACA), and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs as well as from the U.K. National Institute for Health and Care Excellence and the Canadian Psychological Association. Such guidelines are carefully considered distillations of expertise and are revised when research makes it necessary. 

RECOMMENDED READ: AIDS Healthcare Foundation’s Drag Queen Chatbot Spills the “T” on HIV

The Brown University researchers found the ethical violations fit into one of five categories: (1) “lack of contextual understanding,” (2) “poor therapeutic collaboration,” (3) “deceptive empathy,” (4) “unfair discrimination” (algorithmic bias), and (5) “lack of safety and crisis management.” 

As the Brown team wrote:

Reflecting on these findings through a practitioner-informed lens, we argue that reducing psychotherapy—a deeply meaningful and relational process—to a language generation task can have serious and harmful implications in practice.

Counseling—and sex therapies—are more than computational tasks

When companies decide to deploy AI in mental health settings, they are essentially replacing trained personnel who already have educational and ethical frameworks, with something that sounds like it knows what it’s doing, but does not. 

And yet people frequently report they are more comfortable talking with AI about sensitive subjects—like sexual matters—than with human beings. It’s because the AI won’t judge them. 

Though AI may appear non-judgmental, as it agrees with everything, this is really just a function of its sycophantic design. In an LLM counseling situation, this may manifest as an “over-agreement” and “over-validation” of unhealthy beliefs resulting in tragic—and in some cases, fatal—consequences for some individuals, including minors. 

The Brown researchers conclude:

Hence, our findings suggest that mental health practice, especially psychotherapy, cannot be reduced to an NLP task that can be easily addressed with additional prompting or a new benchmark. Rather, responsible AI development for mental health will require interdisciplinary collaborations to outline legal safeguards for accountability in cases of harm.

And that’s another problem: lack of accountability. Human therapists and counselors are personally and professionally responsible when making mistakes or ethics violations. Now AI companies may land in court when their chatbots cause grievous emotional harm. 

Could sex therapy’s PLISSIT model hold a key?

So far there are few, if any, studies focusing specifically on using LLM as sex therapists, though plenty of people use them for sexual entertainment. Sure, some AI have been installed in clinics to deliver sexual health information, but that’s customer service and education, not therapy.

But Jack Annon’s PLISSIT model for sex therapy, published in 1976 and still in wide use, may hold the key to one particular AI advantage. 

The graphic representation of PLISSIT is a triangle balanced on its point, divided into four segments. “P” stands for Permission and is the widest, topmost segment. Annon’s idea is that just having permission to talk about sexual matters is therapeutically valuable for the most number of people. For many people, just having and using this permission may be enough. 

So I wonder, could AI’s glib gift of gab be an asset in an intake process, essentially granting the client initial permission to talk about sensitive topics, without fear of judgment? 

I can imagine an AI taking an extensive sex history, without adding extra commentary. That history could then be turned over to a human practitioner with bonafide credentials. As a virtual assistant, there might be a place for AI in a counseling practice. 

The rest of the PLISSIT triangle stands for Limited Information, Specific Suggestions, and Intensive Therapy. Each segment is necessary for smaller numbers of people. 

AI could deliver limited information and specific suggestions—but only those deemed appropriate by a human professional. In other words, AI might be able to function in a limited way as a perpetual assistant, but never as a counselor.

Image Source: A.R. Marsh using Ideogram.ai. 

The post More Reasons to Avoid AI Sexual & Mental Health Counselors appeared first on Future of Sex.

Why a disposable speculum and a hand mirror may be the best sextech to own

It’s almost 2026. Ladies, do you know where your cervix is? 

Apparently not. According to a new report based on a survey of 3,196 women, almost all participants could not correctly name all parts of their genital anatomy. 

According to Personal Care Insights, this staggering statistic, and many others almost as startling, are the result of a survey conducted by the sexual wellness company, O Positiv Health, in a preview of their upcoming State of the Vagina Report. 

The findings are based on a demographically representative sample of cisgender women who live in the US. The full report will be published in January 2026. 

I say “vulva,” you say “vajayjay.” 

It’s 1973. I was a teenage pregnancy counselor at the Beach Area Community Clinic in a coastal town in San Diego County, CA, and the proud owner of the first edition of Our Bodies, Ourselves: A Book By and For Women by the Boston Women’s Health Book Collective. According to Wikipedia, OBOS was revised and expanded six times, with the final edition published in 2011. 

With this source of powerful knowledge at my adolescent fingertips, how could I have ever imagined that in the century to come, most people with female-gendered bodies would know even less than I did? 

I don’t know what happened to my copy of this book, but these days Our Bodies, Growing Older: Women Aging with Knowledge and Power (1987) has a place of honor in my sexology bookshelves.

In those heady days of women’s health activism—and the clinic where I worked was also at the vanguard—one of my best adult friends, Marcia Kerwit (aka Marcia Wexler), was one of those standout pioneers who went around the country teaching groups of women to do their own gynecological self-exams with a speculum, a hand mirror, and some decent lighting.

Marcia asked me once, while we were talking and sipping tea at her house, if I’d like to learn how? I declined, though I’m not sure why. I certainly wasn’t squeamish—after all, part of my clinic job included making sure the stainless steel speculums were sterilized, along with performing pregnancy tests and delivering results and resource information to anxious patients.

Marcia would later collaborate on the phenomenal book, A New View of a Woman’s Body: A Fully Illustrated Guide, by the Federation of Feminist Women’s Health Centers (US), published in 1981. You can find an online copy at the Internet Archives. A free account will allow you to read it. Copies on eBay range from $30 to $100 USD. 

Did I mention Marcia was and is a constant inspiration to me, even though she passed many years ago? Knowledge of friendship preserved.

Knowledge lost and found—and lost, and found again

A New View contains historically significant illustrations by Suzann Gage, RN, including the first contemporary drawings of all features of the internal clitoris. As there was a dearth of female anatomical information at the time, she researched and based her work largely on cadaver dissection drawings in medical textbooks from the late 1800s-early1900s. 

But NIXIT’s timeline of “The Invisible Vulva” skips the discoveries of Gage and others in the feminist women’s health movement of the 1960s-1970s. History erased, knowledge lost. 

Similarly Manther, an erotic literature publication, credits the feminist movement with sexual liberation and a focus of clitoral pleasure, its article credits Dr. Helen O’Connell, with “providing new insights into the anatomy of the clitoris” in 1998, ignoring Gage’s contributions seventeen years earlier. 

Dr. O’Connell’s research included dissections on “2 fresh and 8 fixed human female adult cadavers (age range 22 to 88 years)” and concluded “current anatomical descriptions of female human urethral and genital anatomy are inaccurate”—the same discovery Gage made when researching the clitoris. 

The future of sex relies on the past

It’s almost 2026, but if most people with female reproductive systems can’t name all the features of their genitals and reproductive systems, let alone know the difference between vulva and vagina, how can they hope to understand the pleasure-packed erectile tissue of their entire clitoris? After all, most of that is hidden from sight, unless you’re dissecting a corpse.  

But other features are easily discoverable. For example, the original instructions for pelvic self-exams–developed and taught by feminist health activists of the 1970s—can be found on the internet. Once you actually see your own cervix and vaginal walls, it can be as transformative as it was for Suzann Gage, the activist artist inspired to become a specialist in women’s health.

Last summer the New York Post interviewed a doctor who says this self-care can enable a person’s knowledge of their anatomy, what’s normal for their body, and to spot potentially troublesome changes early. Some medical sites also speak of the benefits and provide instructions, but in real life, I’ve yet to have a gynecologist actually recommend this kind of self-care to me, as is probably the case for most patients.

So while speculums, flashlights, and mirrors hardly count as glamorous sex tech, these humble items have a definite place in our sex lives. You might even add them to your toy box, and let your vibrator remind you to grab the speculum and take a peek now and then. 

The future of sex relies on better sex education, for everyone

The findings of the O Positiv Health survey, and similar research before it, reveal a glaring deficit in basic sex education for cisgender women. This is truly mind-boggling, given decades of grassroots activism given above, but also the abundance of newer books empowering female sexuality, such as The Clitoral Truth by Rebecca Chalker and Shari Winston’s Women’s Anatomy of Arousal: Secret Maps to Buried Pleasure, both of which I highly recommend.

Over the years, sex educators have also created clever teaching tools to help people visualize female sexual organs, including the well-known Wondrous Vulva Puppet created by Dorrie Lane in 1992, made of velvet, satin, and other luxurious fabrics. This video shows how one of Lane’s vulva puppets can be used in a class about vaginal dryness. 

Recently the Bulbo Project uses AI-enhanced images to “help make female anatomy facts more visible and understandable,” particularly the clitoris, “an organ often absent from anatomy textbooks and cultural imagery.” Check out their amazing video. 

Though AI can be used to create sex education materials, there may be a danger from AI slop, which can bury accurate information. Perhaps our collective sexual future will once again rely mostly on human to human transmission, like the feminist self-exam groups of the last century. 

And just in case you want to know, according to the O Positiv report preview, the correct answer to their anatomy question is “vagina, ovaries, uterus, clitoris, fallopian tube(s), labia minora, labia majora, cervix, hymen, mon pubis.” 1.37% of respondents got that right, but let’s not forget to name the vulva, urethra, and perineum too. A vulva puppet could help. 

Image sources: A.R. Marsh using Ideogram.ai; Women’s Clinic Class Brochure, A.R. Marsh c. 1972; Bulbo Clitoris and Bulbo Jacket, Kandela 3000, Oct. 28, 2025, public domain

The post “State of the Vagina Report:” 98.6% of Us Women Cannot Correctly Identify Female Sexual Anatomy appeared first on Future of Sex.

An apparently dire present doesn’t mean tomorrow can’t be wonderful

With new age verification laws and attacks targeting the adult industry and LGBTQIA+ people, our rights to sexual autonomy, consensual love, and unbiased education are under threat. These measures often reflect a conservative agenda rather than efforts to truly protect people.

But if history has taught us anything, it’s that the future is ours to make. If that’s the case, we’re willing to fight for it. Because if we don’t, then far sooner than we might expect, we really will live in a world ruled by sexual ignorance, irrational fears, and where healthy desires could land you in jail—or worse.

Lines being drawn

This isn’t an exaggeration. The World Population Review states that sixty-two countries restrict access to adult materials, and thirty-two make the production or use of sex-related content fully illegal.

Meanwhile, Human Rights Watch reports, “67 countries have national laws criminalizing same-sex relations between consenting adults. In addition, at least nine countries have national laws criminalizing forms of gender expression that target transgender and gender nonconforming people.”

RECOMMENDED READ: Age Verification Laws Driving Adult Content Creators Underground

If groups like the Heritage Foundation succeed, the United States could drastically increase censorship, criminalizing sexual expression, education, and those who enable it. Their vision threatens basic rights and freedoms.

Even learning about essentials like birth control is under attack. Planned Parenthood states only ten states require inclusive, affirming discussion of LGBTQIA+ identities. Six southern states either ban discussion of LGBTQIA+ topics in sex education, or require framing such identities negatively.

Like your sex lives depend on it

In the face of these attacks, the fight is about securing our fundamental right to sexual freedom—what Emma Goldman called ‘the right to love and be loved.’

To begin with, it’s important to stay informed: both about these and similar threats to our sexual rights, but also the vitally important sexual facts conservative laws are aiming to suppress.

Planned Parenthood is one such invaluable resource, as are the American Sexual Health Association(ASHA) and the World Health Organization (WHO). 

Unfortunately, due to the current US administration’s intervention, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is no longer reliable and should be avoided.

The mentioned Human Rights Watch, along with the American Civil Liberties Union and the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom (NCSF) are excellent resources for tracking anti-sex laws.

Stand for love

Never forget that the most potent way to battle against sexual ignorance is to open our minds to exciting new possibilities. Though an admittedly odd choice in this context, H.P. Lovecraft said it best, “The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.”

By this, I mean that if anything, sexual conservatism seems fueled by unreasonable fears: masturbation is bad, pornography is self-destructive; LGBTQ+ people are (at best) confused or (at worst) were “groomed” by an abuser; sex education leads to promiscuity, the list sadly goes on and on.

The scientifically proven reality is that none of the above is remotely true, that masturbation and sexual fantasies are physically and emotionally healthy, sexual pleasure helps ensure people experience safer and happier lives, LGBTQIA+ people deserve nothing but respect, acceptance, and support. 

Above all, we can turn optimism into action. Instead of waiting for change, actively challenge bigotry and misinformation. Join local or online advocacy groups, vote for policies that protect sexual freedom, and have open conversations that promote consent, understanding, and inclusivity. Every small step you take contributes to building a future filled with hope, respect, and consensual enjoyment.

Image Sources: Depositphotos

The post Fight for the Future: How to Usher in the Next Sexual Revolution We Desire—and Deserve appeared first on Future of Sex.

Over sixty is sexy: “I’ll have more of what she’s having”

A new study has concluded that more older women in the United States are using sextoys, and having more orgasms when they do, in both solo and partnered sex. These conclusions are based on a representative sample of 3,001 female-identified respondents over the age of 60.

A November 26th press release from The Menopause Society just announced these results, based on a study conducted by researchers from The Kinsey Institute and Department of Gender Studies, both at Indiana University at Bloomington, and was fielded in 2023 by Prodege, a professional data collection site. 

Though it’s tempting to describe these results as the Golden Age of Sextech meets the Golden Years and leave it at that, the truth is, one of the reasons for this is hardly surprising. Researchers said “COVID-19 may also have influenced the use of sextoys, since reports indicated a spike in the sale of sextoys during the pandemic.”

Of the women who reported masturbating at least once in the last year, 46.4% used toys almost always or always during masturbation, compared with 5.1% who used sextoys almost always or always during partnered sex. Those who reported almost always or always using sextoys during masturbation were significantly more likely to report always or almost always having an orgasm compared with the lower frequency sextoy users.

The researchers also suggest that due to a growing number of older women living alone, sex-toy companies have recognized them as a unique market, increasingly designing and marketing toys specifically for women in this demographic. 

Someone old, something new—try a toy and don’t be blue!

Let’s face it, the physical changes that come with aging aren’t always enjoyable. For people with female-assigned bodies, some of those changes include the thinning of vaginal tissue, leading to dryness and discomfort; differences in hormone levels; and other results of menopause and beyond. 

These changes, combined with factors such as the loss of a partner or partners, illnesses or other physical challenges, and feelings of being invisible and undesirable in a culture that seemingly only values youthful beauty, make it easy enough to give up on your sex life and just f-f-f-fade away (Boomers, you’ll get this reference, I hope). 

Or at least, that’s how it used to be. Now, with the internet absolutely bursting with sextoy companies, especially ones that are female or queer-owned, and an array of clitoral, vaginal, anal, and nipple toys, plus lubricants—not to mention immensely useful senior sex ed websites like Joan Price’s—the only real barrier to accessing new pleasures might be financial. 

Even the American Association of Retired People (AARP) has gotten into supporting erotic elders with blogs like “10 Top Sex Ed Tips for Those 50 and Older.” Better yet, try Kinkly’s “How to Have a Fulfilling Sex Life After 50” as it’s better informed.

Why not enjoy yourself more than once a year?

The benefits of an active sex life or fairly frequent bouts of self-pleasure are well-known. WebMD lists diminished stress, improved sleep, boosted immune system, pain relief, and many other advantages of sexual intimacy, with Healthline and AARP having similar lists. 

That said, these sorts of lists may be discouraging for single people, which is  where masturbation and sextoys come in; especially important for people to know who live in female-shaped bodies.

Back to the study: 1,451 of the 3,001 participants said they masturbate, but a surprising 89 of them only did it once a year! 528 said they did it a few times a year. 394 said they self-pleasured a few times a month, 137 said they did it a few times a week and 10—“those few, those happy few” (Shakespearean scholars, you’ll forgive the paraphrase from Henry V, I hope)—did it at least once a day. 

649 respondents said they always experienced orgasm during masturbation and another 462 said they almost always did. 212 always used sextoys during masturbation and 166 almost always did. However, 814 of the 1,451 respondents had at least tried using a sextoy at least once during masturbation. The most popular toy types for both masturbation and partner sex were penetrative toys and external vibrators. 

Almost all of the respondents who said they self-pleasure indicated they would like to have more sex, though it is not clear if it was partnered sex they wanted more of). But since only 612 of 3,001 respondents said they had partner sex at least once within the last year, we might assume this is what they meant.

Give yourself over to absolute pleasure

Life is short and its pleasures may be fleeting, so why not reach for a sextoy or a

partner—or both—every chance you get? The more pleasure, the better, right? When you feel crummy or in pain, a jolt of joy might be just what you need. We all need to permit ourselves to enjoy what our bodies can give us, more often than not.

But maybe many people don’t, because they don’t understand the benefits of pleasure, or feel intimidated or shy about exploring their options. The researchers suggest that older women and female-identified people would benefit “from information from health care professionals about sex, masturbation, and orgasm. Studies indicate, however, that only a small proportion of older adults seek professional help for sexual concerns.” And that’s a shame, because professional help does exist!

The significance of this study, and others like it, cannot be overstated:

Rather than supporting ageist assumptions about lack of interest in sextoys or orgasm among older adults, this study demonstrates that many older adults use sextoys and that their use promotes orgasm. In this regard, there may be more similarities than differences between younger and older adults. Orgasm, in turn, may promote positive health outcomes that could improve overall health and well-being in older adults.

‘Nuff said.

Image source: A.R. Marsh using Ideogram.ai

The post New US Study Finds Older Women Use Sextoys More Often and Have More Orgasms appeared first on Future of Sex.

Can affective neuroscience theory actually make our pleasures more pleasurable?

At first glance, it seems like an obvious hypothesis—“core emotions can also influence sexual function and, specifically, that imbalances in core emotions are the bridge connecting psychiatric symptoms (eg, anhedonia) to sexual dysfunction (eg, anorgasmia)”—but mental health researchers from Stanford University, the Palo Alto Veterans Health Care System, Rutgers University, and the University of Padova have recently published a sophisticated, targeted literature review sure to have profound impacts on the way we understand and clinically address sexual dysfunctions and wellness. 

Boom! But what is affective neuroscience theory (ANT)? The researchers explain:

Affective neuroscience is the study of the brain substrates of emotional, embodied experiences. Affective neuroscience theory (ANT) is based on experimental evidence that all mammals are hardwired with 7 primary subcortical emotional operating systems, or “core emotions,” that have overlapping but distinct circuits buried in the deep, ancient parts of the brain. Imbalances in the 7 core emotions can affect multiple aspects of the individual’s psychosocial well-being (eg, depression, anxiety, substance abuse).

The authors describe the primary premises of ANT: 

Core emotions exist and are essential to the human experience.

Core emotions are visceral, embodied, somatic experiences, not just the cognitive awareness of those sensations.

Core emotions are highly relevant in the treatment of sexual disorders; therefore, an affective neuroscience model is needed to guide treatment of sexual dysfunction.

If that’s already a bit much, read on—there’ll be a test at the end of this article. (Just kidding.) 

Stress erodes sex

While it may feel easier to take medication than do meditation, the effects of stress and worry on physiological function and enjoyment are well known. 

A particularly good article about erectile dysfunction (ED) in Allohealth describes how stress diminishes blood flow to the genitals; increases cortisol which then diminishes testosterone; creates mental distraction; and activates the sympathetic fight, flight or freeze—instead of fornicate— portion of the nervous system. 

On the same subject, an article in Healthline says: 

Psychological factors such as stress and anxiety are common and curable causes of erectile dysfunction, as these mental health conditions can disrupt the brain’s signals to the penis, affecting blood flow.

Healthline recommends “alternative treatments such as relaxation techniques, meditation, yoga, and acupuncture” to complement sex and anxiety therapies. Of course a medical check-up is always advised.

The ANT study mentioned above lists a variety of clinical approaches and relaxation techniques that can complement affective balance therapies to improve sexual function and enjoyment. These include hypnotherapy, progressive muscle relaxation, breath training, mindfulness meditations, and more. 

Affective Balance Therapies (ABT) 

The researchers in the ANT review found “the affective neuroscience of personality is an empirically backed, translational framework…[that] remains underutilized in sexual medicine” and that affective balance therapies (ABT) based on ANT “provide a useful template to guide clinical practice” for all manner of sexual difficulties.

To demonstrate how affective balance therapies aren’t just applicable to ED, the ANT review includes a case study of a woman with anorgasmia; a man reporting detrimental sexually compulsive behavior; and a spinal cord injury patient with low libido and low sexual satisfaction. 

In addressing the anorgasmic woman’s belief—“I can’t orgasm”—by shifting it to “I can learn to orgasm,” the therapist delivered the same kind of classic positive suggestion designed to counter negative self-talk that is also used in hypnotherapy. And in using an adult sex education approach, the therapist also encouraged the woman to explore her own body using sextech. The client was able to eventually orgasm by herself and with a partner.

Hypnotherapy was explicitly used in the case of the woman with spinal cord injury, helping her to “create different experiences of being in her body, using her imagination to ‘feel’ bodily sensations that she had lost.” 

In the case of the man with detrimental sexual compulsions, the therapist incorporated breath-work, guided imagery, and mindfulness techniques—often also part of hypnotherapy—in addition to psychoeducation. 

It’s a balancing act: the 7 primary “core emotions”

Popularly known for investigating laughter in animals, the late Jaak Panksepp, a neuroscientist and psychobiologist, published his book on affective neuroscience theory in the late 1990s. 

Panksepp identified seven primary or “coreSELF” emotions, which he identified in both animals and human beings. In essence, animals—and people—are drawn to stimuli that feel good and are averse to sensations that make them feel bad. The ANT researchers wrote: 

Panksepp identified and defined 7 core emotional systems—SEEKING, FEAR, RAGE, PANIC/GRIEF/SADNESS, LUST, CARE, and PLAY.The terms are capitalized to distinguish from the colloquial usage of the labels.These systems can be further broken down into aversive systems, which include FEAR, RAGE, and PANIC, and affiliative systems, which include CARE, LUST, SEEKING and PLAY. 

It’s beyond the scope of this short article to describe the intricacies of this theory, but these emotions and interactions are interactive and the theory helps to shed light on various sex-related mental health conditions. For example, the ANT article describes depression as low SEEKING of new experiences and high PANIC, possibly resulting in low PLAY opportunities (joyful experiences).

The basic goal of ABT seems to consist of aiding the client in balancing these core emotions while managing their behavior. The work starts with assessing clients using two scales: Affective Neuroscience Personality Scales (ANPS) and the LUST scale. 

Our sexual future is both mindful and embodied

The above review opens an incredible vista into neuroscience insights and clinical work that really can help people suffering from a lack of sexual pleasure and function, most likely resulting in lasting improvement. 

Such research, in this case partially supported by a Veterans Administration Career Development Award, may be the last of its kind in the US for the foreseeable future. Let’s hope researchers and students in other countries will continue to investigate the application and efficacy of affective neuroscience in sexual therapy.

Image source: A.R. Marsh using Ideogram.ai

The post When It Comes to Sex, Minds Really Matter appeared first on Future of Sex.

Health resources, non-sexual imagery, written erotica, trans expression, and more would be illegal

If passed, Michigan’s House Bill 4938, the Anticorruption of Public Morals act, effectively criminalizes anything on the internet that is “deemed to corrupt public morals.” For Joshua Shriver, the bill’s author, and his co-sponsors, Republican representatives Joseph G. Pavlov and Matt Maddock, such material includes “various forms of pornographic content and other depictions that violate the act’s standards.”

Penalties for violating HB 4938 include felony charges for anyone convicted of willingly distributing any material the state government says will be corrupting to adults, carrying a fine of up to $125,000, and/or imprisonment for up to 25 years.

Sex equals jail

Introduced in September of this year, HB 4938 still has a long way to go before landing on Michigan’s Democratic Governor, Gretchen Whitmer’s, desk—who, despite recently supporting her state’s new anti-deepfake legislation—is unlikely to sign it into law.

And if Whitmer should, for some reason, decide to sign it, there’s a high probability it’ll be subsequently thrown out due to its obvious Free Speech violations.

RECOMMENDED READ: Companion Bot Companies Quake as a New California Law Targets Their Products

However, the fact that HB 4938 was introduced to the Michigan House or representatives proves there’s a serious, organized, and ongoing threat to suppress not just adult content but potentially everything related to reproduction, sexual education, invaluable health-related resources, gender and trans expression—and anything people like Representative Schriver don’t like.

If you think that’s hyperbole, HB 4938 specifically targets:

Depiction, description, or simulation, whether real, animated, digitally generated, written, or auditory, that includes a disconnection between biology and gender by an individual of biological sex imitating, depicting, or representing himself or herself to be of the other biological sex by means of a combination of attire, cosmetology, or prosthetics, or as having a reproductive nature contrary to the individual’s biological sex.

If that’s not blatant transphobia, then I don’t know what is.  Then there’s it having such vague terms, how could anyone differentiate between explicit materials from important sexual information sites?  In short, if it has to do with sex, then, innocuous or not, it—and you—could end up in the bill’s crosshairs.

They know it when they see it

Sharing what might prove to be devastating ambiguity with many other anti-porn legislations, Michigan is also specific when it comes to sex or barely sensual depictions, including anything made “to sexually arouse or gratify, including videos, erotica, magazines, stories, manga, material generated by artificial intelligence, live feeds, or sound clips.”

Reading that—while you still can, that is—should send an extremely unarousing shiver down your spine.  Spicy audiobooks?  Illegal.  Music with provocative lyrics? Illegal.  Love poetry?  Illegal.  Video games with sex scenes?  Illegal. Caught purring sweet nothings in your partner’s ear?  Both of you, as well as anyone with whom either of you might have shared it, could be looking at a quarter-century in a Federal prison.

Sex equals hope

It would be easy—not to mention dangerously foolish—to dismiss HB 4938 as yet another attention-seeking, yet pointless attempt, by anti-sex zealots to appeal to their intolerant and ignorant base.  

Much as we hate to admit it, we urgently need to wake up to the fact that there are a number of people in the United States and in many other countries who’d like nothing better than locking up or even executing you, me, or anyone  “deemed to corrupt public morals.”

If there’s going to be a future where these sorts of misguided beliefs are relegated to the history books, we need to fight back.  Case in point, let’s embrace the undeniable truth that consensual sex—and depicting it in movies, books, songs, stories, et al.— is fun and more than anything else makes us totally, absolutely, wonderfully human.

Starting with nonjudgmental, comprehensive sex education.  As the World Health Organization (WHO) states, citing a three-year study on the subject, “Evidence consistently shows that high-quality sexuality education delivers positive health outcomes with lifelong impacts. Young people are more likely to delay the onset of sexual activity – and when they do have sex, to practice safer sex—when they are better informed about their sexuality, sexual health and their rights.”

Whether you’re offended by HB 4938’s assault on our inalienable rights, rightfully scared that you or those you care about could be arrested and imprisoned because of it, or just wanted to keep Representative Schriver’s hands off your dirty books, join us in condemning these and other attempts by similarly misguided bigots who keep trying to make sexual pleasure a criminal offense.

We can have a bright, beautiful, inclusive, accepting, and sexually knowledgeable tomorrow—but only if we do everything we can to make it a certainty and not a tragically remote possibility.

Image Sources: Depositphotos

The post 1984 in 2025? Michigan Law Aims to Outlaw Adult-Content – And Too Much That Isn’t appeared first on Future of Sex.